Set Of Cognitive Processes Research Articles

Cognitive Behavioral Processes Across Psychological Disorders: A Review of the Utility and Validity of the Transdiagnostic Approach

The transdiagnostic approach states that there are key cognitive and behavioral processes responsible for maintaining symptoms and these are shared across psychological disorders (Harvey, Watkins, Mansell, & Shafran, 2004). The first goal of this article is to justify the potential utility of a transdiagnostic perspective for theory, research and treatment using empirical evidence and clinical vignettes. We then take as an example one set of cognitive processes—attentional processes—to illustrate the approach. Evidence for three attentional processes is provided: vigilance to external concern–related stimuli; vigilance to internal concern–related stimuli (self–focused attention) and attentional avoidance. It is concluded that each of these attentional processes are transdiagnostic. We then discuss three possible resolutions to the question: How can a transdiagnostic perspective be valid when the different psychological disorders present so differently? The three proposals are: (1) variations in idiosyncra...

Dissecting the computational architecture of social inference mechanisms.

Scientists have been dissecting the neural architecture of the human mind for several centuries. Dissecting its computational architecture has proven more difficult, however. Within the cognitive sciences, for example, there is a debate about the extent to which human reasoning is generated by computational machinery that is domain specific and functionally specialized. While some claim that the same set of cognitive processes accounts for reasoning across all domains (e.g. Rips 1994, Johnson-Laird & Byrne 1991), others argue that reasoning is generated by several different mechanisms, each designed to operate over a different class of content (e.g. Baron-Cohen 1995, Cheng & Holyoak 1985, Cosmides & Tooby 1992, Leslie 1987). Indeed, it has recently been proposed that the human cognitive architecture contains a faculty of social cognition; a suite of integrated mechanisms, each of which is specialized for reasoning and making decisions about a different aspect of the social world. Candidate devices include a theory of mind mechanism, an eye direction detector, social contract algorithms, permission schemas, obligation schemas, precaution rules, threat detection procedures and others (e.g. Baron-Cohen 1995, Cheng & Holyoak 1985, Cosmides 1985, 1989, Cosmides & Tooby 1989, 1992, 1994, Fiddick et al 1995, Fiske 1991, Jackendoff 1992, Leslie 1987, K. Manktelow & D. Over, unpublished paper, 1st Int Conf on Thinking, Plymouth, UK 1988, Manktelow & Over 1990, M.Rutherford, J. Tooby, L. Cosmides, unpublished paper, 8th Annual Meeting Human Behav Evol Society, Northwestern Univ, IL 1996, J. Tooby & L. Cosmides, unpublished paper, 2nd Annual Meeting Human Behav Evol Society, Evanston, IL 1989). To decide among these sometimes competing proposals, psychologists need empirical methods and theoretical standards that let us carve social inference mechanisms at the joints. We will argue that the theoretical standards needed are those of the 'adaptationist programme' developed in evolutionary biology. To show how these standards can be applied in dissecting the computational architecture of the human mind, we will discuss some recent empirical methods and results.

Emotional face recognition and EEG measures

Twenty one adults looked at emotional (sad, happy, fearful) or neutral faces. EEG measures showed that emotional significance of face (stimulus type) modulated the amplitude of EEG, especially for theta and delta frequency band power. Also, emotional discrimination by theta was more distributed on the posterior sites of the scalp for the emotional stimuli. Thus, this frequency band variation could represent a complex set of cognitive processes whereby selective attention becomes focused on an emotional-relevant stimulus.

Understanding ''Dance Understanding"

relations of space and time, of space and proportion, as well as concrete awareness of the movement phrases and body shapes and their connections in the overall performance. Heightened awareness of relationships between the various parts of the moving body, as well as among the dancers working together in a performance, results in a state of "thinking in movement". Following Merleau Ponty, and Maxine Sheets-Johnstone, the movement becomes the presence of thoughtP From this brief overview, it is apparent that dance performance represents an enormously complex set of cognitive operations requiring attention to several different domains. Erlebnis requires thatwe consider kinesthetic processes, feelings, and ideas, all in relation to movement. While Erlebnis appears to be the primary feature of knowledge considered from the point of view of the performer, a performance can also function as symbol for communicating ideas and feelings. Hence, through movement, a performance may present knowledge about something other than itself, as when the movement tells an edifying story or imitates the movements of the planets. In such instances, the performance approaches Erkenntnis, but this does not seem to be its primary function. Because the producer is also the receiver of the knowledge given in the performance, the dancer is in a unique position with respect to knowledge. As the producer, the dancer is in a position to share in the discoveries that unfold during the creative process; as the receiver, he/ she also aware of the outcome that is shared with audiences, critics, and theorists. While a dancer's knowledge may include what has been discovered during the creative process, there are apparent differences between the knowledge experienced directly by the producer and knowledge as it appears to the audience, and in criticism and aesthetic theory. The audience does not undergo the internal feedback of the performer and typically is not on the same level with respect to knowledge of the choreography and training. Rather the audience's knowledge, though firsthand experience, depends on seeing and other sensory and conceptual modes of information, including the kinesthetics, being transmitted and processed by the mind-body systems. The audience's knowledge, as well as that of critics and theorists, predominantly, but in varying degrees, are forms of Erkenntnis or knowledge about the 26 Ann Marie De Angelo, principal dancer, Jeffrey Ballet, Interview, New York, November, 1980. 27 Maxine Sheets-Johnstone, "Thinking in Movement," Journal of Aesthetics andArt Critidsm, 39:4 (1981), 398-407.

Attachment theory, metacognitive functions and the therapeutic relationship in eating disorders.

J. Bowlby's attachment theory is used to explore a fundamental motivational force in human behaviour, namely the search for physical and emotional protective intimacy according to an integrated viewpoint remote from Freud's drive-based approach. This theory has received contributions from ethology, the neurosciences, psychoanalysis, cognitive psychology and evolutionary epistemology. Attachment patterns or styles express both the mental and behavioural strategies adopted by individuals to cope with their attachment needs, and their relational history in this area. Experiences of adequate quality promote metacognitive functions, namely a set of mental processes whose role is to protect the individual from psychopathological suffering and construct and articulate a sense of self. Attachment theory and metacognition are the underlying assumptions of reflections on the dynamics marking the development of sometimes very difficult relationships between therapists and eating disorder (ED) patients, who are being increasingly classed as "severe patients" on account of their interpersonal characteristics.

La función ejecutiva y sus trastornos

Executive function is a set of cognitive operations, which are sustained by the complex activities of the frontal lobe systems. Executive function is responsible for programming, establishing goals, classifying, executing, controlling, changing, monitoring and confronting all the mental activities. To review and to actualize neuropsychological literature about executive function, its development, its structure, its theoretical model, its alterations in different neurological and neuropsychological disorders, and its clinical qualitative and quantitative assessments. Executive function is a multidimensional construct of the cognition, which is structured and modified through the development during childhood, and which is altered during different neurological and neuropsychological disorders, and which could be evaluated in a qualitative or quantitative approaches.

Mental accounting matters

Mental accounting is the set of cognitive operations used by individuals and households to organize, evaluate, and keep track of financial activities. Making use of research on this topic over the past decade, this paper summarizes the current state of our knowledge about how people engage in mental accounting activities. Three components of mental accounting receive the most attention. This first captures how outcomes are perceived and experienced, and how decisions are made and subsequently evaluated. The accounting system provides the inputs to be both ex ante and ex post cost–benefit analyses. A second component of mental accounting involves the assignment of activities to specific accounts. Both the sources and uses of funds are labeled in real as well as in mental accounting systems. Expenditures are grouped into categories (housing, food, etc.) and spending is sometimes constrained by implicit or explicit budgets. The third component of mental accounting concerns the frequency with which accounts are evaluated and ‘choice bracketing’. Accounts can be balanced daily, weekly, yearly, and so on, and can be defined narrowly or broadly. Each of the components of mental accounting violates the economic principle of fungibility. As a result, mental accounting influences choice, that is, it matters. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

La lecture-en-action : entre le présupposé d'un monde objectif et son accomplissement situé

BARTHÉLÉMY Michel - Public Space and Humanitarian Aid. This paper examines a text produced by an NGO, to see how it proceeds in order to resolve the uncertainty surrounding the identity of a population as victims - Rwanda refugees in Zaire, as it happens. It is not these people's situation that is equivocal but the fact that certain member States of International Organizations in charge of refugee aid decide not to help them, at the cost of keeping the real situation from international public opinion. Through this case study, the aim is to show the pertinence for textual analysis of centering one's approach on the description of reading procedures, considered to be a course of observable actions rather than a set of cognitive operations. The analysis seeks to sound the process of how meaning is built into a text, as well as how the reality described by the text is a social construct.

Introduction to Parkin/Baddeley dialogue

Fortunately, it is the rare neuropsychologist who still uses the term “frontal lobe functions” to refer to the collection of supervisory and regulatory mental processes we now typically call the “executive functions.” Most of us have come to realize that simply using a neuroanatomic moniker for a set of cognitive processes does not a neuropsychology make.

Measuring component and sets of cognitive processes in self-regulated learning.

We explored forms of cognitive engagement at 2 levels ― component cognitive processes and sets of these components, labeled acquisition and transformation ― that L. Corno and E. B. Mandinach (1983) described in their model of self-regulated learning (SRL). We collected data on students' cognition using 3 different measures of SRL processes ― a global self-report scale, a self-report scale administered immediately after each of 6 academic tasks, and traces of cognition obtained while working on tasks. Also, we examined correlations between these measures of SRL and aptitude variables. Multitrait-multimethod analyses revealed that measures of SRL are not coherent

Measuring component and sets of cognitive processes in self-regulated learning.

Measuring component and sets of cognitive processes in self-regulated learning.